Thursday, October 11, 2012

Peter, Come Home

The last eight weeks I have been slogging through a tough, fifteen-week sermon series in the book of 1st Peter.I haven’t enjoyed it.1st Peter is a bit odd to preach through.I didn’t think it
would be.I like the book
devotionally.I just haven’t enjoyed it pedagogically
or homiletically.This fact has been
weighing on me.I actually told my
associate pastor, “I don’t like 1st Peter.”That seems weird for a pastor to say.

However, I may have caught a second wind at the half way
mark of this first Petrine epistle by way of my 11 year old daughter.Taking her to school yesterday she asked me
to put on Mumford and Sons.I
obliged.Then she told me about a dream
she had.In her dream the band Mumford
and Sons had a woman singing back-up harmonies.Then she told me that in her dream they were singing a song about Peter
(the one in the Bible).I asked her if
she could remember what the song was like.She couldn’t.She did remember
the title of the song though.“Peter,
Come Home”.Brilliant.I had been praying for that same thing.I just wanted this letter of his to fit, to
make sense, to “come home.”

I felt oddly comforted by this vague dream of my daughter’s.Then I did a strange thing.I wrote a song for her, and me, I guess.I’m not a musician.I’m not even a poet. That did not stop me from writing my daughter’s
dream.The rough, folksy, acoustic, wordy,
reflective, and harmonic lyrical stylings of Mumford and Sons and the Avette
Brothers banged around in my mind as I wrote.

So, I guess I’ll ask you to listen to this song.It’s about Peter- A disjointed
man who loved Jesus and wrote a disjointed letter about Jesus’ love.I’ll need you to provide the music.And however you play the music in your mind,
make sure someone in your band has an unkempt beard that may or may not smell
like a craft beer. (And if one of you musician types want to take a crack at it, I'd love to make my daughter's dream come true.)

Hi, I'm Rob and the musical part of the MacLeod-Rife hermeneutical imperialism board at Westminster Pres. Seeking to dupe the under-read, over-opinionated masses with self-important theological carpet bombing (it's what Jesus' wife urged him to do). Aaaand, I'll take a stab if you're alright with that?

Those who are forgiven much, love much. Those who are loved much, forgive. The man who protested so rashly at Caesarea-Philippi learned to bear the same destiny he protested. Both protest and martydom were born of love. One naive, one mature. One in the darkness of agenda, before the rushing wind and flames of Pentecost. The other on the brink of the Kingdom's near fullness, the dawning of Peter's true self, finally at home.